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Coach Roy brings plenty of fire to Avalanche bench

Former goalie known for his intensity

By Adrian Dater The Denver Post

Posted:
05/25/2013 10:40:05 PM MDT

Updated:
05/25/2013 10:40:10 PM MDT

After Avalanche road games, on the team plane, it was time for players to relax and get their minds off hockey for a while. The night's bruising battle, win or lose, would take a back seat while players enjoyed a cold one or chilled out playing video games or watching movies. For everyone except Patrick Roy.

"He wanted to talk hockey all the time, especially after games, on the plane," said Dave Reid, Roy's teammate with the Avs from 1999-2001. "All the young guys would immediately turn on their video games, but Patrick had to talk about the game. If we won, it was 'What could we have done better? What do we need to do to be better?' After losses it was 'This can't happen again. We need to address this right now.' So I'd usually be one of the few older guys, along with Adam Foote or Ray Bourque, who'd sit with him and talk hockey the whole ride."

As the Avalanche's new head coach and vice president of hockey operations, Roy is sure to face questions about whether his drive and sometimes volatile temperament is suited to coaching NHL players who aren't likely to achieve the level of success he had as a Hall of Fame goaltender.

Roy is obsessed with hockey, has been all of his life. He and younger brotherStephane spent countless hours in a skinny hallway in the family home whacking tennis balls in makeshift hockey games, with cinched-up pillows wrapped around their legs for goalie pads.

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Young Patrick spent virtually all of his money on hockey trading cards, arranging teams to his liking on a bed as he played general manager.

When he was 8 years old, in 1973, Roy and his parents walked into the office of Bob Chevalier -- the director of youth hockey in Sainte Foy, Quebec. Roy announced "I want to play hockey. When can I start?"

"I thought: 'Quite a bit of confidence in this kid,' " Chevalier recalled.

Underneath the macho swagger that characterized his brilliant playing career was a fear of failure that caused Roy to never let up. Even in his final couple of seasons with the Avs, despite four Stanley Cup championships and a record three Conn Smythe Trophies to his name, Roy's intensity to succeed forced him into video rooms to go over his technique long before his teammates arrived.

"He was always very curious. Even during practices, most of the goalies, when we'd be explaining a drill, they'd wander off, drink water or not pay attention," former Avs coach Bob Hartley told the Calgary Herald. "Patrick was always one of the first guys in line by the boards, on his knees in front, and he would listen. That's Patrick. Even at the top of his game, the best goalie in the world, an icon, he wanted to know more. That always fascinates me about Patrick."

Roy never forgot anything in relation to himself and hockey. He remembered everything -- every goal against, every game, every slight -- in amazing detail. He loved it when people said he couldn't accomplish something. He was one of those people who used it as motivation, always reminding himself how the person who slighted him would pay.

When Jeremy Roenick mocked him after an Avs loss in the 1996 Western Conference semifinals against Chicago, Roy responded with his famous "I can't hear what Jeremy says because I got my two Stanley Cup rings plugged in my ears." Chicago didn't win a game the rest of the series, and Roy soon would have more Cup rings than ears.

When Melanie Brodeur, then the wife of New Jersey Devils goaltender Martin Brodeur, proclaimed "It's going to be fun when we win it," with the Devils needing only one victory to capture the 2001 Stanley Cup, Roy overheard her and then told his teammates the Devils wouldn't win another game or score another goal.

Legend has it that Roy was furious with himself for allowing one goal in those next two games, even though the Avalanche outscored New Jersey a combined 7-1 to win the Cup.

"It wasn't enough to be just good. With Patrick, you had to be the best or else," Reid said. "I remember when I first came to the Avs (in 1999), Patrick and Footer drove me home from the airport. And I'm sitting there thinking, 'This is a pretty sweet setup here. I'm coming to a great team.' And the whole 45-minute drive back from DIA to downtown, all they kept talking about was 'We need this, we need that. We're not going to be the best until so and so happens.' I just thought, 'Wow, these guys, Patrick especially, they're pretty intense.' "

Roy's intensity could manifest in temper tantrums too. His fights with Detroit goalies at center ice at Joe Louis Arena; the time he smashed video equipment in Hartley's office in Anaheim after an Avs victory, one he didn't receive credit for because Hartley rested him for eight seconds of a game when the Avalanche scored the winning goal; his brush with the law after a domestic dispute with his wife at the time in Colorado (the charges were dropped); his occasional fine or suspension as coach of the major junior Quebec Remparts after a tantrum.

Will his drive and temperament translate to well-paid players who may not have the same intensity? Will Roy be just another coach to them?

"I think he's going to be great," said former Avalanche teammate Claude Lemieux. "Patrick Roy will adapt to any situation and make it a winner. He's paid his dues in Quebec and knows how to deal with players as a coach. Especially with Colorado being such a young team, he'll work well with the young players."

Like many athletes, Roy takes his mind off his sport on the golf course. He plays almost every day when not required to be at the rink, and counts many famous golfers as friends, including Tiger Woods. But is Roy any less intense on the golf course?

"Uh, no, not quite," Lemieux said, laughing. "I've seen him break a few clubs, let me put it that way."

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